The Dynasties of the Kanarese Districts of the Bombay Presidency from the Earliest Historical Times to the Musalman Conquest c8.s3.166.3

c8.s3.166.3

There is evidently some mistake here; but if we take the general statement to be the correct tradition handed down, the dynasty became extinct in B.C. 73. The dynasty next mentioned is that of the Kânvas or Kânvâyanas. There were four princes of this line, and they reigned for forty-five years; though the Bhâgavata, through a mistake to be explained hereafter, makes the period to be 345 years. They were followed by the Andhrabhṛityas. But here, there is a statement in the Vâyu and the Mâtsya, the like of which does not occur in the account of the other dynasties. The founder of the Andhrabhṛityas, Sindhuka, according to the first Purâṇa, and Śiśuka, according to the other, is said to have uprooted not only the Kânvas, but "whatever was left of the power of the Śungas."[1] And the Kânvas are pointedly spoken of as Śungabhṛityas or "servants of the Śungas."[2] It, therefore, appears likely that when the princes of the Śunga family became weak, the Kânvas usurped the whole power and ruled like the Peshwas in modern times, not uprooting the dynasty of their masters but reducing them to the character of nominal sovereigns; and this supposition is strengthened by the fact that like the Peshwas they were Brâhmaṇs and not Kshatriyas. Thus then these dynasties reigned contemporaneously, and hence the 112 years that tradition assigns to the Śungas include the 45 assigned to the Kânvas.